PHILADELPHIA — Is Chip Kelly being honest when he says he might not know who will be his starting quarterback until game time Sunday?

Or is the Eagles head coach just messing with the media and not tipping his hand to Sunday’s opponent, the Tampa Bay Buccaneers?

Yesterday was the last day Kelly will meet with the media and the last day the team permits access to the players before Sunday, so at his word there is still no decision on whether Mike Vick or Nick Foles will be under center when the Eagles try to even their record at 3-3 against the winless Bucs.

Vick suffered a pulled hamstring in last Sunday’s 36-21 win over the Giants and has been limited in practice all week. Foles, who relieved Vick in the win and threw two touchdown passes, has taken most of the reps with the first team this week.

“I get a feel from Mike that he is improving,” Kelly said yesterday. “I just go day by day, and I’m on Thursday. He said he felt good, but we’ll see what happens.”

Kelly, asked when he would need to make a decision, joked “12:59.” That would be minutes before kickoff Sunday.

“Really, we’ll just see how it is as we go into it,” Kelly said. “Again, we’re never going to put Mike in harm’s way, and we’re always going to do what’s best for the team. The good thing is we still have three days to get a full evaluation of where we are with this whole thing.

“Mike has been honest. Mike will give you kind of where he is and how he feels. He’s been that way so far. So we’ll see as we get closer to game time where we are.”

Vick, who did some work in practice for the third straight day, said he “could go today if he had to” but also showed caution.

“To say I can go Sunday, I can’t make that statement,” he said. “But I can say I feel better every day. I feel better today than I did yesterday.”

He also added that he’s done more every day in practice.

So is it all a ploy, or is there a chance Vick actually will play Sunday?

“I think we’ll see before the game,” Vick said. “I think I’ll go out there and warm up and see how it feels.”

Vick, who won a training-camp competition with Foles for the starting job, had played well through the first five games. His quarterback rating is 90.6, 9.6 points higher than his career mark of 81.0. He also has run for 307 yards in Kelly’s read-option offense.

“It’s kind of crazy,” Vick said. “I was running fine. I did something a little different, changed the way I usually run, because somebody told me I should, and then it happened. But I’m a quick healer. I’ll be OK.”

By Sunday?

• Starting safety Patrick Chung, who has missed the past two games with a shoulder injury, is close to a returning for Sunday’s game in Tampa.

“He did everything full (Wednesday), so we’ll just see how he rebounds,” Kelly said. “Is there any residual effect from it?”

Chung injured the shoulder in the Thursday night loss to Kansas City and sat out the loss in Denver and the win over the Giants.

Rookie Earl Wolff started in his place. If Chung returns, Wolff and Nate Allen could rotate in with Chung.

“It comes down to the injury factor,” defensive coordinator Billy Davis said. “If Chung is not healthy enough to go every snap, then we’ll rotate with him.”